Businesses can be a force for good if they change their working practices.

WHAT THE BOOK SAYS

This is a manifesto for capitalism which says that companies should start becoming the solution to the world’s problems.

If you want to change the world, do it through business. If you want to help your business, help to change the world.

Be sceptical about fashionable prescriptions of Corporate Social Responsibility and instead use company skills and resources in imaginative ways to help alleviate social problems – Corporate Social Leadership.

It outlines current thinking on CSR and argues that campaigners for social justice and environmental protection should see business as their ally.

Many consumer brands are cultural forces that can make a huge difference if they use social strategies to achieve commercial aims.

ELEMENTS OF THE BOOK I PARTICULARLY LIKE

There are ideas on how globalisation makes the poor richer, why corporations are good for human rights, and how brands can work for social change.

It is full of powerful facts: Infant mortality in developing countries is down from 18% in 1950 to 6% in 1995; illiteracy is down from 70% to 30%.

A UK literacy campaign Valued Youth gets 14 year olds who are about to be expelled from school to teach younger children literacy skills, with a very high success rate for all involved.

The Reach for the Sky careers advice initiative by Sky TV had a massive impact on the quality of career choices made by UK teenagers – and increased viewing at the same time.

Coca-Cola has the best distribution network in Africa – and it’s refrigerated. So they joined forces with the United Nations to distribute AIDS-related drugs.